Works by Jorn Sonderholm

In 2004, Garrett Cullity made a significant contribution to the literature on what the world’s relatively affluent owe to the world’s relatively poor through the publishing of The Moral Demands of Affluence. In this discussion note, I draw attention to a logical problem in Cullity’s master argument in favor of the view that affluent individuals are justified in spending monetary resources on themselves at a level that lies well above what Peter Singer finds justified. The proposition I defend is that (...) the premises leading to Cullity’s conclusion about the moderate, and not extremely demanding, nature of his position are inconsistent. These premises license any conclusion, including the negation of the one preferred by Cullity. (shrink)

Thomas Pogge has recently argued that the way in which research and development of essential medicines is incentivized, under existing World Trade Organization rules, should be supplemented with an additional incentivizing mechanism. One might hold a stronger view than the one that Pogge currently holds, namely that patent rights for essential medicines are morally unjustified per se. Throughout this paper, ‘the strong view’ refers to this view. The strong view is one that enjoys considerable support both within and outside the (...) academic community. This paper critically discusses one specific argument in favor of the strong view. This argument is named the ‘Poggean argument’. This denominator is appropriate because a number of the essential premises of the argument are constituted by propositions that Pogge at some point has defended. The Poggean argument is valid, and defenders of the strong view also have some grounds for believing that the argument is sound. This belief comes, however, with what is arguably a too high cost, namely that the global institutional order becomes very demanding on taxpaying citizens of high-income countries if it is to be just. One may find acceptance of this cost relatively unproblematic, but this cost is, it is argued, unacceptable to anyone who has views on distributive justice that are sympathetic to the core tenets of libertarianism. (shrink)

This article is concerned with Mark Timmons and Terence Horgan's influential twin-earth argument against the semantic views of that school of thought in metaethics that has come to be known as “Cornell realism”. The semantic views of Cornell realism have been developed in greatest detail by Richard Boyd, and it is Boyd's view that is targeted by Timmons and Horgan. In the first part of the article, the twin-earth argument is introduced and two versions of it are disentangled. Thereafter, a (...) defensive strategy is developed against the most powerful version of the argument. The conclusion of the article is that Timmons and Horgan's argument does not succeed in showing that the semantic views associated with Cornell realism are false. (shrink)

Global poverty is a huge problem in today's world. This survey article seeks to be a first guide to those who are interested in, but relatively unfamiliar with, the main issues, positions and arguments in the contemporary philosophical discussion of global poverty. The article attempts to give an overview of four distinct and influential normative positions on global poverty. Moreover, it seeks to clarify, and put into perspective, some of the key concepts and issues that take center stage in the (...) philosophical discussion of global poverty. The four positions to be discussed are labeled the Maximalist Position, the Minimalist Position, Intermediate Position I and Intermediate Position II. After an account of these four distinct positions, we turn, in the conclusion, to a discussion of what role empirical sciences such as economics and political science should play in normative considerations about global poverty. (shrink)

Jeff Wisdom has recently defended the proposition that any view of moral supervenience worth its salt must incorporate a diachronic view of base property exemplification. Let us call the proposition defended by Wisdom p. In this paper, I try to show that Wisdom has offered no good reasons for accepting p. My argumentative strategy proceeds along two separate tracks. First, I try to show that the thought experiment Wisdom employs in order to underwrite p does not offer the intended support (...) for the proposition. Secondly, I try to show that even if the problems with the thought experiment in question are ignored, there is at least one other reason for thinking that Wisdom has not offered a convincing argument in favor of p. (shrink)

In a paper from 2005, Gerhard Overland defends the thesis that one's responsibility to render assistance is not affected by having contributed to the situation by causing harm. Overland applies this thesis to the issue of what duties relatively well-off people have in terms of rendering assistance to the global poor and argues for the sub-conclusion that contribution carries little momentum when assessing our duty to assist people in severe need if we can do so at a little cost. In (...) this paper, I discuss Overland's argument in favor of the sub-conclusion and try to show that it is not sound. (shrink)

Nicole Hassoun has recently defended the view that the relatively affluent members of the world’s population are, prima facie, obligated to ensure that the global institutional system enables all people to meet their basic needs. This paper is a critical discussion of Hassoun’s argument in favor of this view. Hassoun’s argument is first presented. In sections three and four, I try to bring out a number of formal and informal problems with the argument. Section five discusses a number of possible (...) replies to the worries raised in section four. The conclusion of the paper is that Hassoun’s argument should be rejected. There are two independent and individually sufficient reasons for this conclusion: the argument is invalid and contains at least one false premise. (shrink)

Much of today’s international trade is conducted according to trade agreements that involve substantial and uniform protections of intellectual property rights. Intellectual property rights are a socio‐economic tool that create a temporary monopoly for inventor firms and enable such firms to charge prices for their innovations that are many times higher than the marginal cost of production of the innovations. This allows the inventor firms to salvage their research‐costs and secure a profit on their innovations. A large body of contemporary (...) philosophical and interdisciplinary literature suggests that intellectual property rights give rise to a number of ethical problems. This review paper seeks to give an overview of what these problems are. It also offers an outline of proposals as to how these problems might be alleviated, and it briefly explains the two classical defenses of the ethical permissibility of intellectual property rights. The ethical issues surrounding intellectual property rights are most pertinent when it is socially valuable goods that are given intellectual property protection. The discussions in this paper revolve around just one product type in order to bring out the broader ethical issues surrounding intellectual property rights. In line with much contemporary literature on the ethical dimensions of intellectual property rights, the product type in question is life‐saving medicines. (shrink)

Infectious and parasitic diseases cause enormous health problems in the developing world whereas they leave the developed one relatively unscathed. Research and development (R&D) of drugs for diseases that mainly affect people in developing countries is limited. The problem that relatively few drugs are available for diseases that cause an enormous burden of disease in the developing world is called the 'availability problem'. In recent years, the availability problem has received quite a bit of attention. A number of proposals have (...) been fielded as to how this problem might be minimized. Wild-card patent extensions, advance market commitments, cash prizes and the Health Impact Fund are prominent examples of such proposals. These proposals can be thought of as pull-mechanisms for R&D of drugs for neglected diseases. What has been coined a 'priority review voucher' is another pull-mechanism. This paper is a critical discussion of this pull-mechanism. First, the original priority review voucher scheme, as proposed by Ridley et al. (2006), is described. A number of objections to this scheme are thereafter presented. A few amendments to the original scheme are then suggested, and it is argued that with these amendments in place, the priority review voucher scheme constitutes an attractive way of stimulating R&D of drugs for neglected diseases. (shrink)

Antibiotic resistance is a serious public health problem on a global scale. In both developed and developing countries, the unpleasant consequences of the phenomenon are being felt. This paper discusses wild-card patent extensions as a means to incentivize research and development of new antibiotics. The thesis defended in the paper is that the implementation of such patent extensions is an appropriate legislative response to the problem of antibiotic resistance. The general idea of wild-card patent extensions is presented in the first (...) part of the paper. A number of objections to the idea are thereafter discussed and rejected. (shrink)

This paper is concerned with the expressivist account of moral supervenience that Simon Blackburn has offered. First, the account is presented, and an objection to it is thereafter discussed. In short, the objection is that the supervenience constraint in moral discourse is mysterious, given that no similar constraint governs speech and thought in other areas of discourse that seem to be prime candidates for an expressivist analysis. The conclusion of the paper is that this objection can be fended off.

The aim of this paper is to show that David Brink’s influential version of moral realism cannot give a convincing explanation of moral supervenience. Section twocontains an outline and discussion of Brink’s view of moral properties. Section three explicates Brink’s notions of strong and weak supervenience. In sections four and five, Brink’s explanation of moral supervenience is discussed. It is argued that his functionalist view of moral properties means that the explanation of moral supervenience that he explicitly offers is not (...) satisfactory. A suggestion is also made about what the exact nature is of the explanatory challenge that Brink faces inrelation to moral supervenience. Finally, it is argued that Brink cannot meet this challenge. (shrink)

This paper deals with an aspect of the commitment-theoretic account of evaluative compounds that Simon Blackburn has recently offered. The main point of the paper is that the special account of disjunction is flawed because it fails to validate certain very simple patterns of inference. This point is brought out by considering two examples. A reply on behalf of Blackburn is considered, but it is shown that this reply is defective because it makes use of an unacceptable inference-rule. In the (...) last section, the relatively technical point about disjunction is placed in a broader context. It is argued that without an acceptable account of disjunction, expressivism entails revisionism about everyday moral discourse. (shrink)